Boys to Avoid, or Stop Shitting on Teenage Feminism

So, I came across this picture on Tumblr.

And beneath it was a whole boat-ton of really shitty comments bashing on the chick who made this for, well, pretty much making it. Except for #2 and #4, obviously. She’s smart on those two. I’m rolling my eyes so hard I can see my brain.

It was a lot of bashing the gender studies’ teacher that was proud of her for doing it, calling the OP “awful” for making it especially because it mentions feminism, it made the post all about bashing on this girl because they think she means “if you hate feminism you must be awful,” and “oh there should be one for guys” and…Apparently people get butthurt if you decide that you don’t want shitty people in your life.

I got pissed off. Why? Because I’m really fucking sick of people bashing on teenage girls that want to be feminist and are trying to discover why feminism exists and what it does. That is the entire reason they bashed on this girl. And I’m the one who’s “overreacting” for feeling that a) it was a very sexist attack and b) it doesn’t have to be about boys vs girls.

I am really fucking sick and tired of people hating on feminist girls for not liking boys all of the time. Because all you are doing is encouraging the stereotype of the man-hating feminist. I am a feminist (a liberal one mind you) and I am pretty much straight. I like boys. I date boys. I have a boy I want to marry.

But let me tell you now, boys are not all that great all of the time. And I really dislike the fact that you want to shit all over some girls that says “I want to date boys but there are some shitty ass men on this planet (I may have even had some encounters with some) so let me classify some of this so that those boys can stay the fuck away from me.” You hate on it and turn it around and be like “Then men need one so they can stay away from you”…

Well you’ve completely missed the point then haven’t you?

You know, on Tumblr someone hears the word “feminist” and they immediately equate it with “misandrist” despite the fact that they have been told that feminists aren’t necessarily like that. They have yet to separate the sects of feminism the way we’ve separated the sects of Christianity. Nobody hears “Christian” and thinks “Catholic” okay? You ask what form of Christianity they practice, because a Methodist is different from a Catholic, who is different from a Presbyterian who doesn’t do the same things a Lutheran does. Just the same, one should not hear “feminist” and think “radical.” There are radical feminists, but they are not the majority of feminism. On the internet, where they can be anonymous and can shout as loud as they want, they may seem like the majority. But go out in the real world, and talk to real women about what they think about feminism and whether they identify and what they believe and you’re going to find that most of them believe in feminism but don’t use that term because it’s been declared “dirty” and you get associated with the wrong people. Most women, whether they use the term or not, are feminists and they believe in the core teachings of feminism. The core teachings of feminism, by the way, are as follows:

Social arrangements among men and women are neither natural nor divinely determined

Social arrangements among men and women favor men.

There are collective actions that can and should be taken to transform these arrangements into more just and equitable arrangements

That’s it. That’s the core belief of feminism right there. Most women are feminist, even if they don’t use the term.

So let me educate y’all a bit, as a straight feminist who is 27 and has been in the dating pool about a decade or so now. I wish I had done something like this when I was younger. The vast majority of women do not hate men. But we do think that they’re pains in the asses. We also believe that there are some men out there that we shouldn’t get involved with. If this girl had made a list that said “Boys that don’t have jobs” or “Boys that don’t lie” or “Boys that are not cheaters” would she have gotten the same response? Women, feminist and not, frequently complain about the deadbeat men in their lives. Many women have children from men that ended up not wanting to take responsibility for their children and left. Or they have boyfriends that haven’t been employed reliably for years. They stick with men they hate, that cheat on them time and time again. Watch Jerry Springer or the Steve Wilkos show and you see them. And everybody agrees that women shouldn’t go back to these guys.

But when that same woman says “I want a man that I get along with, that shares my views and my likes and my beliefs” especially if those beliefs are feminist in nature, then she gets this shit? Like she isn’t good enough to want and be on the lookout for a man like that, she should just take whatever asshole comes along?

Are people really that hypocritical?

On Tumblr, if a man says he’s anti-feminist, we clap and say “good for you.” We tell them that it’s okay because feminism is a terrible movement and he’s taking a stand for equality. It’s bullshit. In real fucking life, any and every man who tells you he is against feminism, not that he doesn’t like the label or that he calls himself egalitarian, no any and every man who tells you he is against feminism is going to be a sexist asshole. Period. I know this because, wonder of wonders, I used to believe that “what you label yourself doesn’t matter” and I dated a few of these shitheads. In my naivety I thought that, just because he doesn’t like the movement doesn’t mean he’s sexist. No, in the real world what you label yourself can be very important because I found that every man who has told me he’s anti-feminist, for any of the reasons used on Tumblr, has been a sexist prick. So beware. If you, as a straight woman, decide that labels don’t matter and you don’t care that a man calls himself anti-feminist, you will date a sexist prick. Doesn’t matter if you “believe” in feminism or not, because I guarantee that you believe women should have certain rights. You’re on our side. Fair warning: you will spend every political argument wondering how nobody has killed this man yet. You will spend a good deal of time wondering how someone can be that dense/blind/stupid. You will try to dispel the myths, to no avail. And it will drive you fucking batty.

Because these men, they’re not “casually” sexist. They don’t hold beliefs that can be flexible, or that they can be woken up to believe is problematic. I’ve had boyfriends that wanted to punch a catcaller in the face while I was there with him¸ but without him there I should take it as a compliment. I had a boyfriend that believed that ALL sexual harassment cases were false, because women only file those to get back at male bosses. He also believed that most male on female rape cases were false, but most female on male rape cases were true and needed to be taken more seriously. According to him, women were more dangerous sexual predators then men. And in fact, he thought it was shit that men could now rape their wives. He totally believed that it never happened because sex is a “wifely duty” that she should commit to multiple times a week. I should mention that this is the same man that was unable to control his eating and blamed me for his gaining weight (he over 300lbs the whole time I dated him) – by saying (to my 120lb self) that I had “gained ten pounds since the start of the relationship.” My physical attractiveness meant everything to this man, but his health and attractiveness were of no issue, obviously. “I can get any chick I want.” Dude, I could get a better man than you faster than your fat ass could get a hotter chick to replace me. Guaranteed.

If a man tells you that he watches Fox News, or listens to Rush Limbaugh you should run the other way. Generally these men believe in a lot of vastly stupid shit. Televangelist Pat Robinson once said that “the feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is about a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians.” Now, any woman who reads that, whether you agree with feminism or not, is probably going to call that guy an idiot and an asshole. I dated men who would argue that he was right. I’ve had men express surprise that I’m feminist and straight. They ask really crazy questions because they think we’re all radical feminists, when in fact most of us aren’t.

So yeah, she’s right to say “I don’t wanna fuck around with boys who are against feminism.”

But I think maybe boys that don’t know how girls’ anatomy works is worse. Ladies, trust me, you don’t want a man ignorant of that. For one, because he will take every sexist joke about loose pussies he knows and repeat them to you as if they’re funny. For two, because he won’t know anything else about how your anatomy works either. He will probably tell you that he doesn’t like going down on girls because they taste like pee (first stupidly believing that girls piss out their vaginas and second proving he’s never gone down on a girl properly.) He won’t believe a single thing you tell him about your menstrual cycle; not your cramps, or your bloating, or your cravings, or the intensity of your flow. In fact, he won’t even handle it like a woman, he’ll penis out and tell you that you’re gross. If they cannot physically see a change in you, they will not believe it has happened to you, so any bloating or breast tenderness you get better be very very evident. Twenty-first century men will be weirded out by tampons, and they will fully believe that a tampon lost you you’re virginity because it broke your hymen. They will think that if you’re not a 28-day cycler that you’re messed up and probably have cancer. They will think that you cannot get pregnant if you’re bleeding. OH and god forbid you’re period doesn’t show up when you want it to – even if you’re on the pill. I always wait a week after I’m supposed to get it to get a pregnancy test. On the pill, especially the higher dose of hormones I take, sometimes women experience a cessation of a cycle. A boy that doesn’t know how anatomy works will immediately believe that you are pregnant and then will attribute everything else that you do to this fact. Boys that don’t know how anatomy works will attribute a lot of things to your period, even if you’re in the middle of the cycle.

I seriously had a boyfriend, when I was discussing with my mother other birth control options, try to tell me that I shouldn’t get an IUD because they poison women and they’re less effective than the pill. I straight up was like “Fuck that, go Google that shit before you come back and talk to me.” This translate and relates directly to that “boys that call women sluts and whores” thing. Because a man that doesn’t know how your anatomy works probably doesn’t understand that women have sex drives equal to that of men. I have had men seem surprised that I have such a voracious sex drive, and this usually happens the first month I’m dating them. These men may not outright call you a slut or anything – but you might get synonyms and backhanded compliments. You might them calling you “nympho” or something equally as degrading.

Staying on about the same topic, let’s talk about boys who fall asleep immediately after sex. You know, she’s probably not talking about “we had sex late at night” and therefore, sleep after is needed. That’s the kind of chick I am. I section out an hour or so before bed, and then I go to sleep after. Note: I said I section out like an hour of time. Sex should take time, so that both have the ability to be left satisfied. No, she’s talking about a type of boy. A type of boy I spent a year and a half of wasted time with. You know, this prick actually made me think that I was beginning to lose my sex drive? Not that he was a terrible lay and I simply didn’t want to fuck him anymore. No I thought it had to be on me; that it was something I was doing wrong. Why? Because this kind of boy usually doesn’t bother with foreplay, and they’re pretty much “two-pump” gentlemen if you feel what I’m saying. But whenever it was brought up, it became about what I wasn’t doing in bed for him and that’s why it sucked so bad. These type of boys believe you should always go down on them, but will make excuses why they won’t reciprocate. They’ll get pissed off if you say “no” or “I’m not in the mood” because they fully believe sex should operate on their schedule only. They will call you frigid for refusing and rant and rave about just how little sex they get. They will call you the bad lay because you “don’t do anything” and they will blame all of their shortcomings on you anyway. Case in point: I have a friend who is maybe more sexual festive than I am. She likes sex, and has had a lot. She literally had a boyfriend tell her that “for someone who has sex so much, you should be better at it.” Turns out the fault is not on her, but on a man that believes sex is about stuffing it in a hole until you’re done.

Also, any boy that puts another woman down to compliment you is doing the same thing to other women about you. I had this boyfriend that liked to “compare” me to his ex and not with something like “Oh she just used to complain about the tshirts I wore, I’m glad you don’t.” No it was stuff like “well, you’re boobs are bigger but she was skinnier.” I got to know the girl he dated after me and she would mention how he would tell her that she has a great ass but he missed my tits or some shit. Men that put down other women to compliment you are sexist. They are putting down other women based on false stereotypes and they are giving you a view of just how objectifying they are to begin with. It’s a backhanded compliment, and all they’re doing is trying to put you down by comparing you with their false idea of beauty as opposed to liking you for you. Run from them, and run fast.

This brings me to “Boys that are rude to their parents” – and notice that it did not say “mothers” but “parents.” I don’t want a boy that’s rude to either of his parents, male and female alike. Boys that are rude to their parents are also probably a) rude to you – and you’re brushing it off and making excuses and b) rude to everyone else in authority. It’s not cool to be on your teacher’s shit list, and it’s not cool to antagonize any police you may come across. It’s not cool to believe and act like you are the center of the world and anyone who challenges that needs to be fought. You are not that important or special, and ladies you should not date anyone who believes they are. Let me enlighten you, as someone who has grown up seeing shitty parents and knowing how lucky I was to have mine: people who have terrible, neglectful/abusive parents aren’t usually rude to them. If they are forced to live with them, male and female alike spend a majority of their time simply trying to avoid seeing them face to face and having to talk to them. As they grow up, they move out and cut off said parents. They don’t answer phone calls often, they don’t go see them and they don’t generally acknowledge their existence. They don’t waste the time or the energy to be rude to them. Ones that are rude to their parents are generally assholes with parents who are losing their minds.

A lot of times I see women shitted on for disliking rape jokes, mostly because there are plenty of rape victims who use humor to cope (Truth. Hi, how are ya?) However, there are two distinct kinds of rape jokes: those that insult the rapist, and those that make the victim into the clown. One of these kinds are okay, and are generally what rape victims and others find funny. I have no sympathy for rapists, so when I make fun of mine I know exactly who I’m shitting on. But rape jokes that diminish the effects of rape or that put victims down – those suck. Those are offensive and nobody but assholes find them funny. Truth be told, there are men out there who still make jokes about rape victims. For instance, this piece by Patricia Lockwood is great, because it’s she who talks about what happened to her. It is she who finds humor in what happened to her and it is she who noticed and remembered all those goofy things about her rapist. I tell people myself that, on the drive to the hospital to do the rape kit, I saw a car – I forget the brand but the style was “Celebrity” and I was just out of my NSYNC phase so their song “Celebrity” ran nonstop through my head as I got my rape kit done. I find it funny. Or that the gonorrhea medicine tasted like bananas and I wanted more. That’s funny to me, despite the macabre situation. However, jokes like these are not funny. They are terrible and offensive and if you tell them, you pretty much broadcast that you’re a rapist. I’m not testing it to see if it’s true or not, I’m just gonna assume. And if you, as a lady, are around guys that make the latter jokes, just remove yourself from the situation before it’s too late. There’s no mark to distinguish a rapist; that’s the closest you’ll get.

But you know what I really couldn’t understand? Why people made this all about gender, just because she put “boy” on the poster. For me, this goes for women as well.

I do not want to be friends with women who are loudly and “proudly” against feminism. I mean really against. No anti-feminists for me. I don’t care if you say “I don’t like labels, therefore I do not label myself as feminist.” No if you tell me you are anti-feminist, I’m going to move away from you because chances are we will not get along. I don’t need shitty people in my life.

I do not want to hang out with women who call other women sluts or whores. Or any other slew of derogatory comments about women involving their sexual promiscuity or lack thereof. This includes using “virgin” as a slur and calling virgins “prude” or “frigid.”

I don’t want to chill with women who don’t care to figure out how their bodies work and why that knowledge is important. If you are going to blatantly disregard your health, I don’t want to get to know you. I don’t need another broken heart when you die from something that a little knowledge could have prevented.

I don’t want to talk with women who use slurs about any group, even if it’s “reclaimed” and even if you belong to that group. I don’t support the use of “nigga” as a friendly gesture, nor do I think “queer” should be “reclaimed” to become positive. I don’t want to talk with women or men who talk over minorities of any kind.

I don’t want to have conversations with women who are as selfish with sex as men are. I don’t want to talk to women who expect to be eaten out and don’t give blowjobs, or who treat sex as a chore and don’t work to please their partners at least a little. Generally, these are the same women who wanna call me derogatory names because I enjoy sex.

Women who put other women down to feel better about themselves mentally, physically or emotionally – Yup, no friend of mine.

Women who are rude to their parents – male and female alike? Go jump off a cliff or something. Your dad deserves as much respect as your mother does and vice-versa. She’s not “internalizing misogyny” because she stayed home to raise you, and your daddy more than likely did not rape your mom to have you.

Women who make offensive rape jokes (because the only women who get raped are sluts, right)? Yeah, get lost too. You’ve certainly earned your equality to men, so get out of my face.

There were others that people were coming up with. Girls to stay away from or such other shit. But you know, when you turn what this chick wrote from “Boys” to “Girls” you get approximately the same shit the commenters were saying without having to list every. Single. Little. Thing. Out. Individually.

Notice that the whole thing really comes down to “Shitty people to stay away from.” IT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE GENDER REALTED. And you are not a shitty person for telling these types of people to stay the fuck away from you – boy or girl.